


Upon her route unknown

by zinjadu



Series: Wed to Blight [24]
Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Origins
Genre: Bad Parenting, Bonding, Female Friendship, Gen, Herbalism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-12
Updated: 2019-05-12
Packaged: 2020-03-01 01:04:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,547
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18789883
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zinjadu/pseuds/zinjadu
Summary: They met in a swamp, reached an accord at Redcliffe, and then something else began to take root.Or,Caitwyn Tabris has come to Morrigan for a small bit of help, and Morrigan realizes that there might be something more between her and the Warden.Morrigan POV.





	Upon her route unknown

Morrigan pursed her lips as she spread a salve over Caitwyn’s chapped hands.  The skin had cracked and bled as the woman refused to wear gloves as they ascended into the mountains.  Morrigan found that a strange turn for a woman who normally exhibited good sense and reasonable practicality.  Then again, she had become rather close to the  _ other _ Warden lately.  The oafish one, and Morrigan did not care for  _ that _ in the slightest.

“Thanks for this,” Caitwyn said easily, brightly.  Her demeanor was a far cry from what it had been upon their first meeting.  She had been cordial, but cautious. Her expressions studiously blank, eyes shuttered so as to betray nothing.  Familiarity seemed to have bred ease between them, and Morrigan was uncertain whether she welcomed it or not.

“Might I ask why you have come to me, rather than the Circle mage?” Morrigan asked.  “She is an accomplished healer, I will grant her that much.” She watched the elf with the most opaque expression she could, keeping her face as smooth as an undisturbed pond.  Caitwyn shrugged inarticulately, which made Morrigan’s lips thin with a touch of annoyance. Yes,  _ far _ too much time with the oafish Warden, she thought, until she noticed the slight narrowing of Caitwyn’s eyes and the tension in her jaw.  She breathed out slowly, her breath steaming in the cold air of the high mountain peaks, even in late summer. Snow clung to these cliffs, and it was well they were here at this time of year and not later when the passes would become intractable.

“Don’t have a care to listen to Wynne tell me what I should or shouldn’t be thinking about.  And she might be a touch put out that last time she tried to talk to me, I pretended to be only interested in the griffons the Wardens used to keep.  Oh, I’m sure they were a sight, but when the woman  _ insists _ on turning every conversation into a lesson, it makes me want to scramble up a tree and camp there and have done.”

“Ah, I see.  So I am still your lesser choice.”  Morrigan affected a touch of hurt and glanced away, gratified to see Caitwyn sit up straighter and her eyes go wide with concern.

“No!  You—!”  She stopped herself as she saw Morrigan’s face, and rolled her eyes.  “You’re having me on.”

“Perhaps.”  She permitted a touch of disinterested amusement to flicker across her face, but it did please her to know that Caitwyn found the other mage tiresome.  The other woman rolled her eyes but her grin reappeared, and Morrigan worked the last of the salve into the skin around Caitwyn’s nails. “That will soothe the minor breaks in the skin that you have already acquired, however it would behoove you to wear  _ gloves _ .”

“But then I can’t shoot right.  The gloves we have, they’re a bit on the wooly side.  Can’t get a grip.”

“Have you given a thought to sewing some leather patches onto the fingers of them?”

Morrigan allowed herself a moment of preening pride to see the other woman’s mouth drop open before her brows furrowed in agitation.  Caitwyn rubbed her hands together and grunted darkly. “Should’ve thought of that myself.”

“Well, you have been somewhat…  _ distracted _ of late.  It is no surprise you have not given all things their due consideration.”

“Oi!  What’s  _ that _ supposed to mean?”

“Do you think ‘tis gone unnoticed that you and Alistair have been  _ closer _ of late?”  Morrigan raised her eyebrows and regarded Caitwyn cooly.  Caitwyn mirrored her, eyebrows raised in a bemused  _ so what? _ and her face carefully blank, though Morrigan thought she detected an ever so slight blush blooming on Caitwyn’s dark cheeks.  Waving her hand dismissively, Morrigan was prepared to simply let the matter drop, but Caitwyn spoke first.

“Wynne all but  _ threatened _ me, you know.  Me! Saying I was gonna hurt him.”  Caitwyn’s eyes glinted in the deepening dusk, and she glared into the small fire Morrigan had made for herself.  “Like he’s the only one who could be hurt. Like  _ I _ would—but she’s  _ no idea _ about—”  Caitwyn breathed out slowly and huddled down into her too-thin coat.  “Never mind, I know you don’t care and don’t like him. It just… it’s irritating is all, people looking at me and making assumptions.  What’s she think anyway? That I’m some common whore of knife-ear out to snag myself some bastard prince? Ha. She doesn’t know nobs like I do, and Alistair’s no prince which is a good thing in my books.”

That was a veritable tirade from the normally contained woman.  Between the sheer amount of words, and the lapse in grammar and clipped vowels of her native accent, discerning Caitwyn’s foul humor was not difficult.  Morrigan had witnessed Caitwyn’s struggles before, but they had all been kept behind a wall for no one to share. Now, Caitwyn was unburdening herself to…  _ her _ .

“I know something of that, yes.”  Morrigan kept her voice even, but the words gave Caitwyn pause.

“I suppose you do.”  As if their exchange had been a spell in an of itself, Caitwyn uncurled and held her hands out to the fire and wiggled her wind-burnt fingers.  Morrigan allowed herself a small frown at the sight. If Caitwyn did not take care of her hands, she would no doubt lose some of her dexterity, which was something Morrigan would rather not occur.  Certainly she had no wish to fall victim to a trap Caitwyn could not disarm.

“Do you have all you need to make the alterations to your gloves?  Should you not, I believe I might.” Caitwyn raised her head up at the question, and her eyes looked inward as she reviewed a mental list of her own inventory.  

“I do, but… would you mind if I did it here?  Don’t want to intrude, though.” Curiouser and curiouser.  Morrigan merely raised her brows as if considering the request and then waved her hand, as though she were granting an indulgence.

“Very well, you may.”  As quick as a shot from her bow, Caitwyn dashed to her pack and returned with the gloves, thick grey woolen things that offered no grip at all, and a scavenged scrap of leather.  The elf settled down by the fire, her knees just brushing the small ring stones, and she laid out gloves across her lap. Morrigan retrieved the grimoire from her pack and turned her mind once more to the task of setting herself free of that crone who had raised her.  

The sun set early in the mountains, and the lengthening shadows stretched towards them, undeterred by the light of the fire.  A muttered curse jarred Morrigan from her study, and she glanced up to see Caitwyn with her finger in her mouth and droplets of blood staining her woolen gloves.  Shutting the grimoire with a snap, Morrigan yanked the woman’s injured hand out of her mouth and conjured a globe of mage-light.

“That salve is  _ not _ something you should have in your mouth,” she scolded.  “Tis little more than a prick of the needle, besides.”

“It hurt.”  Caitwyn flexed the finger in question as if to demonstrate the point.  “Not used to sewing with leather, and I think I broke the needle.” Morrigan peered once more at the finger and narrowed her eyes.  She gestured the small green ball of light closer and peered at the wound.

“Indeed, there is a sliver lodged in your finger.  I doubt the needle was of much quality if it broke in such use.  Be still,” Morrigan commanded and squeezed the flesh together, forcing the sliver of bone needle out.  Caitwyn squirmed and sucked in a hissing breath, but otherwise bore up well. With a dull flash of white, the miniscule needle shard came free and dropped harmlessly into the grass.

“Considering I found the needle in Redcliffe, you’re probably right.”  Caitwyn examined her finger, flexing it and testing the pad of it. She winced as she prodded at her wound, but it would not fester, Morrigan knew.

“Surely we have a small amount of coin by now enough to  _ buy _ a needle?  Why did you scavenge it?”

“Waste not, want not.  Both my parents taught me that.  Mama especially. Why buy something when you could find something?”

“Or steal something?”  Morrigan allowed her tone to be arch, and she was pleased when Caitwyn allowed herself a brief laugh.

“You’re not wrong.  Can’t help but have a few things find their way into my pockets.  It’s a habit at this point, though I’m not sure if its a good one for a Warden to have.”

“The Wardens do what must be done, and perhaps tis necessary to acquire what one needs regardless of the method one employs to do so.”

“Maybe, but that’s beside the point.  Now I don’t have a needle, my gloves are a bit bloody, and I’m no closer to having gloves I can use.”  

Morrigan pursed her lips and removed the gloves and leather scraps from Caitwyn’s possession and unearthed her own set of needles and thread.  She set to work, the firelight and the werelight of the wisp enough for her to see by. Caitwyn shuffled closer, peering down at Morrigan’s work.

“You didn’t have to, you know.  But thank you,” Caitwyn said. Morrigan ignored it.  Better that this was done than not. Then the elf huffed and hugged her knees to her chest with a satisfied grin on her face.  “Occurs to me that our parents teach us a lot of bad habits. Can’t say I’m overly sorry about stealing when I was younger. Had to, or so Mama said.”  

Morrigan watched Caitwyn from underneath her brows before returning to the gloves.  The needle flashed through leather and wool, Morrigan’s own needle made of metal rather than cracked bone.  It was a small window into the Warden’s past that Morrigan did not expect, and she found to her surprise that she wished to see what lay beyond.  Caitwyn had trusted her at Redcliffe, and Morrigan had extended that trust in kind, as she had informed the Warden of Flemeth’s intentions to steal her body.  Could not more trust be gained? 

To what end, Morrigan wondered.  If Flemeth died, nothing would hold Morrigan to Caitwyn’s side.  Nothing could ever compel her again. And yet.

“Flemeth is an exacting woman.  Failure was met with stern punishments,” she said.  Morrigan soon found herself detailing the moment when that beautiful golden mirror had been dashed to shards upon the ground.  Her child’s heart had broken that day, and she had begun to hate the old woman who ruled her with an iron fist, with her cruel expectations and riddles and tests.

“Those are harsh lessons to teach a child,” Caitwyn said, frowning.  “But I suppose my mama was much the same. Oh, she never broke my things, not that we had much to break, but she made it clear that trusting humans was a fool’s game, and even other elves weren’t always to be trusted.  We could only rely on family.”

“And now, here you are, an elf trusting humans.  All four of us, in fact.” Morrigan’s lips curled in a smirk, and Caitwyn’s did much the same.  Her green eyes glinted in the dark, and with her ears and sharp features, Morrigan was reminded not of a cat as some compared elves to, but a fox.  Indeed, there was something very vulpine about the younger woman’s face, and once she had seen it, Morrigan could not dispel the fanciful image.

“Might as well trust everyone I meet now, just to throw caution to the wind.  There any more assassins about? Zevran’s pretty handy in a fight, could use a few more of them maybe.”

“I still do not trust the food he prepares,” Morrigan said darkly, but that only made Caitwyn laugh.  She had not been joking; she could not prevent all folly, no matter how closely she watched when the Antivan prepared meals.  Returning to her sewing, Morrigan finished the last few stitches and tied off the threads before presenting the finished results to the younger Warden.  “There, now you should be able to fire your bow or disarm a trap without risking your appendages to the wind.”

“Ah, thank you!  These are even better than I could manage.  Papa taught me how to sew after Mama—when I was fifteen.  Came to it a bit late, and never was much good at it. Not compared to some of the other girls at least.”  She stuffed her hands into the gloves and tested the grip of the leather and grinning all the while. 

“You are welcome.  Now, tis growing late, and I am certain you will wish for us to start early on the morrow.”

“Is that my hint to leave off?”

“I thought it less a hint and more a statement of facts,” Morrigan said in her driest tone.  Caitwyn stood, brushing the leaves and stray grass off her breeches.

“Then I’ll see you in the morning, Morrigan.  Maybe tomorrow we can talk about how to handle your mother?”  The question was unexpected, as the Warden had let the matter drop since leaving Redcliffe.  However, it gave Morrigan pause to consider that the thought had not been as far from the elf’s mind as she had feared.

“That would be prudent.  Perhaps, once we have acquired the cooperation of the dwarves, I will have a better grasp of how to defeat her.”

“Would be helpful, that,” Caitwyn agreed with an unexpectedly impish grin.  “Night Morrigan,” she offered and removed herself back to the main camp. Morrigan but raised her head by way of reply, though she continued to study the younger Warden.  She sat down next to Alistair, and Morrigan’s chest constricted at that unpleasant sight, showing off her gloves. From her spot, she could not hear the exact words, but she could make out the drawling, disbelieving tone of the man.  Likely Caitwyn had given  _ her _ credit for the alterations, and that elicited an unexpected flicker of delight.

They had an accord, herself and the elven Warden, something approaching a trust from both sides though Morrigan still held some secrets close to her.  She had the sense that Caitwyn did much the same, but in between those secrets there was a truth that had begun to take root. Something new and strange and unexpected.  Perhaps unwanted, and yet.

And yet she had not dug it out.

Morrigan doused her fire and sought her bedroll, but for a long time she pondered the night sky and the stars flickering above.  At this elevation the sky was markedly clear. So different from the closed in, tree lined confines of her swampy home. No, that place was no longer her home, nor would it ever be again.  She would be  _ free _ soon, and perhaps she would have Caitwyn to thank for it.

The moon rose slowly, a mere sliver of itself, bone white in the starry sky.  A mere sliver, something that did so little to illuminate the world. A mere sliver.  And yet, that miniscule slice of the moon was not  _ all _ of the moon.  The fullness of it waited merely to show itself.


End file.
